


Makes You Think All The World's a Sunny Day

by AnnetheCatDetective



Category: The Big Chill (1983)
Genre: (well suffering from depression but alive), Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, College era, Coming Out, I mean everyone is in it but no one else is Important, M/M, Photography, Road Trips, although it's still, because dammit let them be happy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-09
Updated: 2018-10-09
Packaged: 2019-07-28 18:15:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,349
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16247150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnnetheCatDetective/pseuds/AnnetheCatDetective
Summary: Alex and Michael have never been subtle. Somehow, it still takes this for anyone to notice.In which Alex discovers something he can be passionate about.





	Makes You Think All The World's a Sunny Day

**Author's Note:**

> The first chapter does feature an outing via playful invasion of privacy, so fair warning for that. However, the characters in question were going to absolutely no trouble to keep their relationship hidden from their friends, and everyone is accepting.
> 
> Anyway, this one is not compatible with anything else I've written about this movie even though I have a bunch of steady headcanons that I use throughout. But I feel like this is a much better story honestly.

    “So where’d you disappear to this time?” Harold asks, looking up from his book. Late Sunday evening, Alex coming back in from a weekend of wandering, and he’d taken Michael with him, hadn’t asked any of the others.

 

    “Big wooden roadside statues.” Alex grins, dropping his bag on the floor. Michael, coming in behind him, grabs it to carry down the hall where their rooms are.

 

    Alex kicks his shoes off and drops into the opposite corner of the couch from Sam, hands coming up to cradle the camera hanging around his neck.

 

    “You get a lot of pictures?”

 

    “Oh-- um, some. I’ll have to develop them, I mean… they’re not all good trip pictures, there’s arty shit for my photography course.” He shrugs. “I don’t know what they’re even looking for. But I had to pick something.”

 

    “You should have taken figure drawing, that one’s got nude models.”

 

    “You can get nude models for photography, too. You just have to find them yourself, the class doesn’t provide them.”

 

    “I took figure drawing, you’re better off sourcing your own nude models than having them provided.” Harold says.

 

    “You get a lot of volunteers wandering around asking, or do you get slapped?” Sam laughs.

 

    Alex just shrugs again. “I haven’t wandered around asking. You think I should start?”

 

    “I want to watch you start asking.”

 

    Michael comes back in, without the bags and without his shoes, and Alex grins at him, holding up the camera.

 

    “Hey there, baby, you ever thought about nude modeling?” He teases, stifling a laugh as Michael pauses to stare at him.

 

    “You couldn’t afford me.” He shakes his head, taking the middle of the couch and putting his feet up on the coffee table.

 

    “Didn’t get slapped.” Alex says to Sam, stretching his own legs across Michael’s lap.

 

    “Yeah, we’ll see how it goes when you start using that line for real. There’s a limit to your charisma, and ‘hey there, baby, you ever thought about nude modeling’ is where that line’s gonna be drawn.”

 

    “If I’m going to slap him, it’ll be for leaving his bags all over the floor. Put your stuff away.” Michael says, but he settles a hand around Alex’ shin, which takes any urgency out of the admonition.

 

    “I’ll put my stuff away. Where’d my stuff go?”

 

    “By the bed.”

 

    “You have something against sitting normally, or do you just need to be in everyone’s space?” Sam asks, and Alex stretches out to push a foot against his thigh in response. “I tell you guys I missed you while you were gone?”

 

    “Nope.”

 

    “Good.”

 

    “You missed us.”  Alex grins, nudging him again. He lifts his camera, snapping a picture of Sam’s amusement and irritation, Michael’s laugh.

 

    “I missed _Michael_.” Sam says. “Who puts his gross, sweaty feet on the coffee table where they belong, and not on _me_. And he’s a better wingman than you are.”

 

    “Right, you need the help.” Harold snorts, rising. “Well, I’m going to bed. Some of us have class in the morning. And those of us who fail major exams in history are doomed to repeat it.”

 

    Sam groans, but he gets up as well, ruffling Michael’s hair in passing, thumping Alex on the shoulder. After a moment, they abandon the couch as well, to crowd in at the sink to brush their teeth side by side, to wind up in Michael’s room together undressing for bed.

 

    “You really want to, um, to take those pictures? I mean is this whole photography class going to see me naked if I say yes?” Michael asks, running his tongue along his lip, nervous. Half-smiling in spite of those nerves.

 

    “They don’t have to. I mean someone might get a peek but… no, I don’t have to pick those to turn in or anything. I don’t want to share _everything_ , then I’d have to deal with competition.”

 

    “Yeah, sure.” Michael laughs. And then he stops, expression soft, almost awed. “Yeah. Sure.”

 

    “What, yeah?”

 

    “Yeah. I mean, if you promise it’s _artistic_.” And he goes all doe-eyed, over the top, folding his arms over his bare chest.

 

    Alex steps in close and hooks a couple fingers under the waistband of Michael’s pajama pants, inching them down with a grin.

 

    “Oh, I promise…”

 

    “I mean it.” Michael laughs, letting Alex tug them down until they fall to the floor, letting Alex shepherd him into bed, lay him down and move to straddle him.

 

    He doesn’t go for his camera, and Michael never puts the pajama pants back on.

 

\---/-/---

 

    “Just you and Michael?” Nick asks, leaning in the doorframe while Alex packs, late Friday afternoon. “We haven’t gone off as a whole group in a long time.”

 

    “Oh-- Yeah, we should. Next time. This is… It’s not like a fun trip? He’s helping me with a photography project. Is next weekend enough notice to get everybody out, though? We can go pretty much anywhere.”

 

    “Yeah, I think we can get everyone. Hey… you know, you could ask me if you ever need a hand on another project.”

 

    There’s a very brief pause, before Alex smiles at him. “Sure, yeah. You have anything you need to cram for mid-week? If you can quiz me on chem I’ll return the favor, any subject.”

 

    “I’d better take you up on that, actually. Wednesday?”

 

    “Wednesday’s perfect.”

 

    “Cool. Well, have fun with your not-fun trip.”

 

    “We will.” Alex laughs, sliding past Nick and grappling him into a one-armed hug in passing, before letting himself into Michael’s room.

 

    It’s Michael’s room, but it’s their bed. They’ve stopped bothering with sleeping apart, and Michael’s bed is bigger, more comfortable, the view out his window just slightly nicer. Alex still uses the desk in his room, the closet and dresser, but it’s no longer a mix of nights together and apart. The idea that he would ever have to knock before entering the room where he sleeps every night is laughable. Maybe if he was with someone else and there was the chance Michael was changing, but right now he’s just packing.

 

    “C’mere.” He pushes the door shut behind himself, dropping his bag and opening his arms, and Michael abandons his packing just a moment to fit himself right up against Alex, arms around him in return. “You need a hand with anything?”

 

    “Just this.” Michael smiles, kissing him. He leans in, holding Alex against the door and taking his time with it, soft and easy. He can’t _stop_ smiling even as they kiss. They have enough to smile about-- Base Line Lake, camping out of Alex’ car, and if they could avoid other people, casual nudity.

 

    Photographs of that casual nudity. They’d experimented a little since the idea was first floated, shyly agreed to. Michael lying in bed, hair spread out across the pillow, bedsheet preserving his modesty, but only just. The slight glow of perspiration, the loose grin, that spoke to how recently he’d been sucked off. Michael toweling off after a shower, face hidden from view, ass on display.

 

    It’s a nice ass, for a guy as skinny as Michael mostly is. Tight, squeezable, the one really soft place on him, though even then there’s not much soft over the firm. Alex doesn’t think he can be blamed for squeezing it, when Michael’s got him backed up against the door to be kissed in the first place. If it’s not enough just to enjoy the feel of Michael under his hands, there’s the sound he makes that’s somehow both a laugh and a moan all at once, straight into Alex’ mouth before he slides his tongue past Alex’ lips.

 

    “You sure you don’t need a hand with anything?”

 

    “Save it.” Michael snorts, pulling back. “Soon it’ll be you, me, and the great outdoors. And if we’re lucky, not the whole sailing team.”

 

    “I’m definitely not sharing you with the whole sailing team. They can’t take up the whole lake, there’s got to be somewhere where no one will bother us.” Alex wraps his arms around Michael’s waist, tugging him back in close for a moment. “It’s gonna be just you and me… sleeping under the stars. Skinny dipping.”

 

    “I’m not skinny dipping in October, and you’re definitely not taking pictures of me naked if I’ve just come out of a frigid fucking lake.” He cups Alex’ face, kissing him again. “Let me get my stuff, we’ll go.”

 

    “Yeah. We’ll go. Hey… You make me happy.”

 

    Michael’s face lights up-- and Michael understands the gravity of it, understands how fleeting and fragile and precious happiness is. How important it is when it comes, how important anything that brings it is.

 

    “You make me happy.” Michael pats his cheek. “Let me get my stuff.”

 

    “Yeah.” He lets him go, watches him drop the last couple of things into his bag. They swing by the kitchen long enough to get sandwiches made, a thermos of coffee, and their food for the weekend packed, and then they call out their general goodbyes to the others on their way out.

 

    Michael curls up in the passenger’s seat, long limbs folding in on himself, twisted to the side to watch Alex as he drives. Alex always drives, on road trips, they stop if he needs to stop, but Michael hasn’t been easy behind the wheel the past couple of years and Alex doesn’t push him. He’s borrowed the keys for short errands on surface streets, which is more than he did for nearly the first year after losing his parents. He’d been anxious about being on the road at all, the first few months, would get in a car if Alex was driving, a hefty weight of trust to place on a man who sometimes gets the impulse to veer into the path of an oncoming semi, or off of a bridge.

 

    He’s pretty sure there are no circumstances under which he’d do that with anybody else in the car, even if it wasn’t Michael, even if that trust wasn’t something special. It’s still something to be trusted.

 

    If Michael needed to drive, Alex thinks he would. Most of the time he doesn’t, really. He’s comfortable riding long stretches in the front seat now and that’s enough to let Alex know that when they’re out in the real world, Michael will be fine even if Alex isn’t always there to do for him. He kind of likes to imagine he might be.

 

    They arrive at the lake around sunset, and Alex sets about getting their sleeping bags unrolled and zipped together, while Michael unpacks their sandwiches. At least for the night, they don’t have any company. If they had to share the lake with the sailing team in the morning, well… they’d deal with it. For now, they have a little battery powered lantern, a transistor radio, and their now-shared sleeping bag, have sandwiches and coffee. For now, they have everything to themselves.

 

    “We could make all the noise we wanted.” Alex points out, when they’ve finished eating.

 

    “A little early, isn’t it?” Michael laughs.

 

    “What else are we gonna do in the dark?”

 

    “I dunno.” He scoots a little closer, reaching out. They reach for each other, slide into each other’s arms. They kiss, sweet and slow, until Crimson and Clover fades out and My Cherie Amour starts up, and Alex pulls away.

 

    “Dance with me?” He pulls Michael to his feet, tugs him close.

 

    “What happened to ‘what else are we gonna do in the dark’, huh?”

 

    “I just thought of what else. Dance with me.”

 

    Michael already is, but he doesn’t bother pointing it out, just lets Alex sway him back and forth.

 

    They dance through a couple new songs they don’t know, before sliding into the sleeping bag, wriggling out of their clothes from inside the insulated safety. Michael reaches to click the lantern off, letting the radio play.

 

    “Handsome…” Alex hums, nuzzling right up against Michael’s jaw, rubbing his nose against his beard.

 

    “You can tell all that in the dark, huh?”

 

    “I know you’re handsome.” He slides a hand over Michael’s chest. “You feel handsome.”

 

    “I’ll take it.” Michael laughs, his own hand traveling along Alex’ arm up to his shoulder. “You feel… you feel nice. You’ve got beautiful eyes, you know that?”

 

    “Oh, you can tell all that in the dark?”

 

    “Yeah.” He rolls them over, sliding a leg between Alex’. “I can. I can tell a lot of things in the dark.”

 

    “Okay then.” Alex grins, grabbing at Michael’s ass. “Hey…”

 

    “Hey.” Michael rocks against him a little, both of them soft, but it never takes that long. Not when Michael is in his arms, warm and naked. The friction of his beard against Alex’ throat, and the gentle softness of his lips-- and every so often, the scrape of his teeth, a flash of tongue. It never takes that long, with the soft curve and firm muscle of Michael’s ass perfectly fitting Alex’ hand, and with his other hand in Michael’s hair. With the heat between them and the sounds they draw out of each other…

 

    It’s all good, it’s good when they’re just kissing, just barely filling out, as much as it’s good when they’re right on that edge and it’s all sparks. It’s good when he’s lying on his back beneath Michael, when he’s got him spread out beneath him, when they’re rolling around with no real aim or preference…

 

    Michael shimmies down deeper into the sleeping bag, kissing his way down from Alex’ throat to his chest, lower still. Alex buries his hands in Michael’s hair, his eyes unfocused, aimed towards the stars. This, this is very good. Of all the people he’s ever made it with, or made out with, or maybe even thought about it with, Michael has the fullest, softest lips. And he can tease, or he can be tender, or he can just _go_ for it, and it always feels like it’s just what he needed. The way he uses his tongue and the way his big hands wrap around Alex’ hips or stroke along his thighs or slip underneath him to squeeze his ass… the way he makes noise, always, humming and moaning and slurping with abandon, the needy sound at the back of his throat when he urges Alex to thrust up if he wants to…

 

    He loves watching him work, but under the circumstances, the stars are a nice view.

 

    And then, there’s the way the beard chafes at the sensitive skin of his inner thighs, the way Michael rubs his face against him until he’s tender and desperate, and damned if he doesn’t love that beard. He has his legs up over Michael’s shoulders in the confines of their sleeping bag, and everything is the rustling and the moaning and the sighing, and the rasp of his beard and the soft, wet heat of his mouth, and the stars overhead, and the thick, soft hair wound around his hands, everything is Michael and a night that’s just theirs, and the radio playing so soft he hears Michael more than the music.

 

    They’re eager and messy, just as eager and messy when they switch places, Michael’s hands shaking when they stroke over his hair and his shoulders, Michael’s legs spread wide, Michael’s back arching when Alex sucks at his balls and twists a hand around him. The shuddery gasps and the sweet way he sighs Alex’ name out after. The softness of his eyes in the moonlight as they settle in each other’s arms and turn off the radio.

 

    “You know I love you.” Alex hums, lying against Michael’s chest. They’ve got one pillow between them and they don’t need another. It’s nicer like this, and warmer. “You know I’ll do anything for you.”

 

    “Mm, like what?”

 

    “What do you want?”

 

    Michael’s fingers twitch, in their journey up and down Alex’ back. “Just this, I guess. Just you.”

 

    “Okay, deal.”

 

\---/-/---

 

    He’d kept his developing photographs as carefully guarded as possible, collecting them all into a box once they were ready to go. He could figure out what to turn in back at the co-op. Pass around the few pictures he had of tourist traps and scenery.

 

    Of course, he leaves the box of photographs sitting on the kitchen table for two minutes while looking for last night’s leftovers and suddenly the whole house is going through them-- the whole house minus Michael, who’s busy with the journalism club, had told Alex to head on without him when he’d swung by to walk together as usual. Someone had dropped the ball somewhere, leaving everyone else to scramble. Alex regrets not just waiting for him now, he could have left him with the photos...

 

    “Hey! Do you mind?” He snatches a picture carefully out of Nick’s hand. “I’ll share when I’m ready.”

 

    “You’ve been promising us trip pictures for a month, from all those times you’ve run off over the weekends.” Sarah says. “And these are really good.”

 

    The two of them have only just gotten into the lake pictures, and so far it’s only the scenery, the plants, the sunrise over the water, hoar frost on leaves, sailboats in the distance. There’s one of Michael silhouetted against the gold light and the pink clouds, looking particularly yogic as he stretches. If you weren’t looking hard, you wouldn’t know he was nude, maybe. No one really comments on it either way, as pictures travel from hand to hand, and Alex is quick to snatch that one back when he spots it, getting it back into the box just as Sam lifts out a stack of photographs to pass around.

 

    They tease him about the ‘arty shit’, close-ups of random objects, odd angles, ones where he’d messed around with double exposure, and he relaxes a little, gets advice on what to submit. They laugh over the next few pictures that come up, of Michael in front of various tourist traps, Michael sleeping in the car with his coat for a blanket.

 

    “He’s going to be so mad.” Meg says.

 

    “No he’s not.”

 

    “You got him with his mouth hanging open and everything, he’s going to get pissy.”

 

    “I mean I’m not the one showing it off to everybody, I just took it.” He snags it back to return to the box.

 

    “These are all of Michael.” Sarah says.

 

    “Well Michael’s the one he always takes, who else would they be of?” Nick snorts.

 

    “No, I mean, they’re all of _Michael._ ”

 

    And she holds up the picture she’d been looking at, Michael standing at the sink in a cheap motel, brushing his teeth, his reflection barely glimpsed, just his bare back, pajama pants slung low across his hips, the sharp shadows thrown by his shoulder blades. Karen holds up an answering picture, Michael reading a battered paperback in the room’s only bed, tee shirt riding up uneven, showing off the crest of one hip, the dip of his navel and the trail of dark hair below. His expression soft but focused.

 

    “I never thought I’d say this, but Michael looks _good_.” Meg picks out another, Michael perched on the edge of the motel’s pool, pushing back the curtain of wet hair from his face, just about gleaming.

 

    “What do you mean you never thought you’d say it, what’s wrong with Michael?” Alex grouses.

 

    All three girls laugh, and Meg shakes her head. “I mean it’s not that he doesn’t look okay, it’s just-- _Michael_. I mean, freshman year we, you know. It wasn’t anything serious, it just happened, but Michael Gold doesn’t really know what to do with a girl, that’s all.”

 

    “Freshman year, though, he’s probably better now.” Harold shrugs. “None of us started out perfect.”

 

    “Yeah, maybe you were his first time.” Sam adds. “You can’t hold freshman year against him.”

 

    “You could have been in on the ground floor for this, if that’s what women want.” Nick laughs, waving another picture. Michael, shrugging into his shirt, the morning light slanting across him, the bed behind him rumpled.

 

    “He said I wasn’t his first, but… I mean he really had no idea what he was doing, I probably was.” She turns to Karen, trading pictures. “You think I should reconsider?”

 

    “You said he tried to have a conversation the entire time.” Karen reminds her. “Not even a sexy conversation. A conversation conversation.”

 

    “You weren’t his first time.” Alex says, doesn’t even think about it until everyone’s eyes are on him. “I was his-- I was his roommate freshman year, I know when his first time was. Two weeks in, week and a half. I mean somewhere in there, early.”

 

    “He’s a mover.” Sam whistles, passing off another picture-- this one taken on campus, Michael lying out on the grass in the quad, little flowers threaded into his beard, jacket rolled up for a pillow and a book open against his chest, eyes closed.

 

    “Okay, thank you, if you don’t mind…” Alex picks up the box, a little huffy. “Pictures back, please.”

 

    They’re still passing the last handful around between themselves, but he can at least gather up anything that isn’t currently in someone’s hand.

 

    “Oh.” Sam says, and Alex freezes.

 

    “Oh what?”

 

    “You weren’t kidding.” He looks up from the picture to Alex, without registering Harold’s question. “You were _never_ kidding.”

 

    “Alex is always kidding. He’s a kidder.” Nick says, still looking over a group picture, Sam and Michael and Harold all wrestling over something, Nick between the girls, rolling on the lawn laughing at them.

 

    “Oh, Alex never kids, he jokes.” Harold laughs. “Oh what?”

 

    Alex doesn’t need to look to know exactly which picture Sam must have. Michael in bed, it has to be Michael naked in bed.

 

    “Oh, this’ll put you off your breakfast.” Nick steals another from the stack Sam had been holding, passing it off to Meg.

 

    “Aww. See? I mean, just looking at this, you can’t blame me for giving him a try.” She shakes her head, turning it to show the others. Michael, wearing nothing but Alex’ tee shirt and a soft-eyed smile, sitting cross-legged on their bed, modesty preserved only by the box of cereal he’s holding in his lap and eating handfuls out of. “How’d you get him to look like this? I took my clothes off and I didn’t get a look like this.”

 

    “He has Quisp in his beard. I can blame you for wanting to go back to that.” Karen shakes her head.

 

    “First, he’s eating children’s cereal.” Sarah nods. “Second, he’s getting crumbs all over the bed. Third… I don’t know, but there’s a third.”

 

    “I’m just, looking at these photos, I’m a little attracted to Michael right now.”

 

    Harold lets out a low whistle, having given up on getting an answer from Sam and just taking the picture.

 

    “ _I’m_ a little attracted to Michael right now. I know we joked about the nude modeling, but--”

 

    “Sorry, joked about _what_?” Karen leans forward.

 

    Nick moves around to peer over Harold’s shoulder.

 

    “ _Tastefully_.” Harold says, and Nick shakes his head.

 

    “Real tasteful, he looks like he just got his brains sucked out through his dick.”

 

    Harold elbows him gently, Sam just shakes his head.

 

    “Hey, give that one back.” Alex says, and there’s an edge to the demand this time that there hadn’t been over gather the other photos, but by the time he gets the words out, Sarah has already taken the picture from Harold, the other girls crowding around her.

 

    “Oh, it is tasteful.” Karen says.

 

    “You don’t have to sound so disappointed.” Sam makes a face.

 

    “Well, we thought we were going to see the goods, maybe figure out what Meg saw in him.” She shrugs.

 

    “I didn’t see anything in him, it just happened. The ‘goods’ are fine, he just didn’t know what to do with it.”

 

    “Isn’t it a little weird having pictures like this of Michael?” Sarah asks, waving it. “They’re… they’re very…”

 

    “Sensual?” Harold suggests.

 

    “Sexual.” Meg corrects.

 

    “Intimate.” Sam says.

 

    “Yeah, I guess that would be weird, if Michael and I weren’t. Take your pick. Sensual, sexual, intimate.” He snatches the picture away. “And he knows what to do with it.”

 

    “Figures.” Meg sighs. “That’s my luck all over.”

 

    Nick and Sarah are both staring at him in shock, but Sam and Harold just look… well, like two guys who went through a friend’s private pictures and feel guilty about seeing more than they bargained for, which is how they should look. But not surprised.

 

    “With _Michael_?” Sarah says at last.

 

    “ _Why_?” Nick says, before pulling back a little. “Wait, all the weekends you guys went off just the two of you, it was so you could fuck?”

 

    “We can do that _here_. And we do. We go off just the two of us because we like to.”

 

    “Right, but you do fuck. That’s why you don’t invite us. Not because you like Michael more than everybody.”

 

    “I mean, I do, but it’s different, yeah. Wait, are you jealous of Michael?”

 

    “Not anymore.” Nick shakes his head.

 

    “Okay. Well, that’s good.”

 

    “Alex, we’re sorry.” Harold sighs. “Nobody expected…”

 

    “Yeah. I know.”

 

    “You guys are… okay.” Sarah takes a deep breath. “Okay.”

 

    “That explains some things about Michael.” Meg nods.

 

    Alex just huffs and gets his photo box in order, taking it to Michael’s room and burying himself under the covers with it. He emerges an hour later, sans box, to install himself on the couch, still in a sulk. He’s in that sulk when Michael comes in and the conversation grinds to a halt, everyone turning to stare.

 

    “What did I do?” Michael asks.

 

    “Nothing. We’re all just mentally undressing you.” Harold says.

 

    “Oh, that’s fine then.” He nods. “Alex does that all the time.”

 

    Any time before this afternoon, it would have gotten a laugh-- it would have at least gotten a laugh from Sam and Harold, who were there joking about nude modeling, and they’d have explained why it was funny to anyone who didn’t laugh. Now, absolutely no one is laughing, and Michael clearly has no idea why.

 

    Alex jumps up from his spot curled up in the corner of the couch, moving to him. “Baby, they know.”

 

    “They know about you mentally undressing me?” He jokes, and then he stops a moment. “Oh. About you _physically_ undressing me?”

 

    “They were going through the pictures from trips and-- from not trips.”

 

    “How’d they come out?”

 

    “Really well, but I mean…”

 

    “Right. I’m naked in some of those.” Michael rubs at the back of his neck, looking off towards the corner.

 

    “Also you’ve been fucking.” Nick says. “So we know about that now.”

 

    Sam elbows him. “We’re sorry about going through your private pictures. That’s what he meant to say.”

 

    “Oh.”

 

    Alex can feel the way Michael’s breathing picks up, and he wraps his arms around him, lays his head on a shoulder. “It’s okay, baby, no one cares… nobody cares.”

 

    “It explains a lot.” Meg adds, and Karen elbows her.

 

    “I mean it does, not in a bad way.” Sam says, moving in to throw an arm around Michael as well. “How you two have been joined at the hip since last year.”

 

    “I guess that’s sort of when things got… official?” Michael smiles, relaxing between Sam and Alex. “I mean, we always… you know.”

 

    “Yeah, I had him first.” Alex smiles, nuzzling up into the beard. “And I get him last.”

 

    “You better get me last.” Michael nuzzles right back.

 

    “Look, you can make out while you’re hanging onto me, but don’t be disgusting.” Sam teases, extracting himself from the three-way embrace. “Save your mushy forever talk stuff.”

 

    “Oh, seeing me naked you can handle, this you can’t?” Michael laughs and cuddles further into Alex.

 

    “We all have to come to grips with how cute your ass is, we don’t need to see you acting this cute on top of it.”

 

    “Coming to grips with his cute ass is my job.” Alex grins.

 

    “I mean coming to grips with ourselves over finding it cute, but--”

 

    “Oh, I do that, too, when he’s not around.”

 

    “Gross.” Meg lobs a pillow at the two of them, though it goes wide.

 

    “We all do it. I mean, we don’t all think about Michael, but we all do it. I bet you do it.”

 

    “I don’t talk about it. That’s the difference between the sexes, we don’t need to talk about things that happen in the privacy of the bedroom or the bathroom.”

 

    “You told Karen and Sarah about Michael.”

 

    “Michael didn’t happen in the bedroom or the bathroom, Michael happened in a sleeping bag, and it was _not_ very private.” Meg shrugs.

 

    “Wait, what did you tell them about me?”

 

    “Nothing.” She says quickly.

 

    “She just said you’re not bad-looking… and that you’ve got a big dick.” Alex whispers to Michael, tugging him towards the couch.

 

    “Oh, did she tell them that or did _you_? I’m pretty sure Meg was not quite so complimentary.”

 

    “She did, I mean she basically did. I’m the one who said you were good in bed, though.”

 

    Michael grins and blushes, and lets himself be pulled down into Alex’ lap. “Well, okay.”

 

    “You’re pretty cute, you know that?” Alex beams up at him, his earlier sulk forgotten, made up for by the new freedom to be open. It’s not that he ever tried to hide it, really, not around the co-op, not much anywhere else, but he’d been a little quieter than he might have liked, hadn’t said everything, had played too much off as a joke if someone laughed.

 

    “Am I?” He plays his fingers through Alex’ hair.

 

    “I’ve got photographic evidence in the other room if you don’t want to take my word for it.”

 

    “You should turn that one picture of Michael in for your class.” Harold says.

 

    “They’re not ready for him.” Alex shakes his head, hand traveling up and down Michael’s leg.

 

    “They’re going to be so touchy-feely now.” Sarah says.

 

    “I don’t know, is that any different from before we knew?” Sam says. “They’re all over each other all the time. Alex is in Michael’s lap every day.”

 

    “He does call him baby a lot.” Meg nods.

 

    “They wore each other’s clothes last week.” Nick adds. “Five times. That’s a lot for a laundry mix-up.”

 

    “Alex puts his chin on Michael’s shoulder all the time.” Karen leans over towards Nick, demonstrating. “Once he said Michael smells good.”

 

    “He doesn’t smell bad.” Meg shrugs.

 

    “He smells good.” Alex says. “And we can hear you, you know.”

 

    “They are always taking care of each other.” Harold says. “Michael picks up Alex’ stuff, Alex brings Michael food…”

 

    “I think they showered together once.” Sam says.

 

    “Once.” Alex snorts. “Yeah, sure. We showered together ‘once’.”

 

    “So we’re cool?” Michael asks, though the tone makes it seem like they must be.

 

    “What else would we be?” Harold smiles over at him, shakes his head a little.

 

    “I mean now I feel stupid we didn’t all see it before.” Karen says. “But sure.”

 

    “Well what are we supposed to think? I mean we don’t know anyone else who’s… like that.” Sarah shrugs. “And I mean, they’ve both been with girls. It’s not like we were looking for any of it.”

 

    Sam sits up a little straighter. “Oh.”

 

    “Oh, what? You just remembered you walked in on them having sex one time but it didn’t seem important?” Nick asks.

 

    “No, I know other guys who are like that. Huh. I think I know a lot of guys who are like that.” He flops back into his seat. “You guys, I think half the theatre department is like that.”

 

    “Well the theatre department is ready for your pictures of Michael, then.”

 

    “I don’t know if I want to share some views.” Alex wraps his arms very firmly around Michael. “A couple things are just for me.”

 

    “I don’t mind other people seeing. I mean…” Michael leans back in his arms, batting his eyes. “If you can still promise it’s all tasteful.”


End file.
